Creating a successful personal brand doesn’t happen overnight. It takes many years, hundreds of handshakes, and thousands of social posts to establish the brand of you. When you are working for someone else, with aspirations of being your own boss someday, there isn’t a lot of time to dedicate to your own tasks but the little things do add up.

Here are a few ways you can build your own brand while someone else signs your paychecks:

Blog

In most cases, you can have a public blog that discusses your industry even if you are employed by a company in it. The trick is to mention where you work in your bio and to link back to the employer in a few places. If you want to keep you job (for now), avoid posting anything that paints your employer in a controversial or negative light. It’s also possible to build a personal brand that has nothing to do with your current job. For example, you may have a passion for pastry baking but work at an accounting firm. This is even more of a reason to have a pastry baking blog – to build up your personal brand in the area where you really want to earn a living, while collecting a paycheck from someone else.

Tweet, snap and post.

You have to post consistently on social media if you want your personal brand to stand out. This doesn’t mean you have to be online all the time; set aside some time to automate social media tasks every week so you are still posting even if you are busy in other areas.

Engage with others online.

It’s not enough to send your message out into cyberspace and hope people respond. You have to give a little too. Read a lot of websites and blogs in industries that are in your area of interest, and follow your favourite personalities and brands on social media. Comment on the posts of others, share articles that you enjoyed, and be an engaged online citizen. You will make more friends in the process who will want to know more about you, and what you do.

Use conference time wisely.

When you are asked to attend a conference event, consider it an opportunity to tout the brand of you. Talk to people in line, ask questions about what they do for a living, and network as much as you possibly can. Make sure you connect with those people via LinkedIn or other industry platforms to keep in touch, even when people change jobs.

Join groups in your field.

Connect with others who are in your industry, or the industry you hope to join, both offline and online. Get a feel for what people are talking about in your field, and what struggles you can expect when and if you go it on your own. Learn from what others are doing and make the learning curve smaller for yourself. This is also an excellent way to make more connections and get your own name and likeness noticed.

Give your best content away.

If you want others to look at you as a thought leader, you need to provide value. The best way to provide value is to show your expertise by giving away your best content for free. This can come in the form of video or text. Many brands do this by creating how-to’s or strategy content to help customers or followers perform better.

Everything you do to make your name more familiar to the people you may need later will pay off down the road. By marketing yourself smartly, you can keep your current job but establish your own personal brand.